Category: Freedom of Speech

It is very easy to speak but it is wise advise to think before you. this is a reality as no one could return the past time, same like to that no one could regain the words speak from mouth.
freedom of speech give right to everyone to say which he want, to express his or her feelings, everyone has a lot of platforms to express but this is should be in mind that your words can hurt to others. and in case of religion, it could create a vast problem to a society. We should respect to the others religion, beliefs and affiliations.

“It is unbearable for everyone to say something against their religious aspects, no matter they belong to which religion.”

You could say against the personal views, political views, even against business matters and everything but freedom of speech doesn’t allow anyone to speak or pass any comment to the Religion.

Instead of Religion, freedom of speech could allow to express your views about everything but it must be considered that don’t give any personal attack or any comment on personal life of anyone. If a society give us right to say everything, it also compel us into the behavioural boundaries that how to respect the others personal life.

As far as my opinion is concerned; communicating with neutral tone and thoughts is a difficult task but no impossible. There have been instances when people believe that freedom of speech is important and sometimes people believe that it does not mean anything. There has always been a conflict between this 2 people.

Freedom of speech on online forums:

Free speech certainly enables uncomfortable ideas to exist online, often forever because “the Internet records everything and forgets nothing”. The right to be forgotten is a modern answer to removing unwanted, outdated, or irrelevant personal information from the Internet. The regulation of hate speech also demonstrates the shifting social context of intellectual freedom towards a right not to be offended. A brand-new European Commission agreement allows four major U.S. companies – Facebook, Google, Twitter, and Microsoft – to block “illegal hate speech” and their users to report offensive images or speech.

Freedom of speech and privacy:

Both freedom of speech and privacy are fundamental rights, which are equally recognized by everyone and all kinds of institutions all around the globe. It is generally thought that these two rights must be in conflict with each other, and sometimes that is the case. But quite often privacy is necessary for freedom of speech (or expression).

Preserving Intellectual Freedom:

So what do we do? How do we balance the old with the new, the traditional with the progressive? How do we unite the future of intellectual freedom with its foundation?
There is no simple answer to these complex legal and social questions. As advocates of equity, diversity, and inclusion, we must remember that free speech is an essential component of social change. To paraphrase Charles Brownstein, the Executive Director of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, free speech and social justice are allies, not enemies.
Progress depends on the free exchange of ideas, access to information, and the opportunity to decide for ourselves. Progress stops when we remove certain materials because they are offensive, unorthodox, or otherwise upsetting. Thus, we must not use social justice as a weapon against free speech. Rather, we must preserve First Amendment values in libraries, publishing, advocacy, and scholarship. Censorship is never the appropriate reaction to controversy.

Listen to my voice. If you require a reason for doing so, let it be only that I am human, individual, and I possess a voice. If you require a more compelling reason, let it be that I have something to say. This is my case; it is no different than yours.

Whatever goes on in the cloud of human consciousness is anyone’s intellectual property, and sharing it, in any manner whatsoever, is their right. Humans are a gregarious group of people who happen to require others as tools to further their stay on this little green planet. Talking, as we all know and understand, is not a problem for many among us; having words inside our heads is quite possibly one of our greatest human qualities. However, the problem arises when certain people dictate what to say, what to think, what to share.

The bulk of controversy surrounding this vast plane of words and expressions is concerned with organized thought forms and ideologies taking issue with what is said. Be it religion, culture or common law; we are no stranger to incidents of words purportedly ‘offending’ certain groups. Make no mistake: an ugly thought targeted at someone is wrong and there is no alibi for it. However, a thought in the semblance of words is still a thought, and not warranting of any action outside the realm of words. An offensive statement is only offensive if one believes it to be so – perhaps, this is why standup comedians swinging their feet in the murky waters of Dark Comedy or Satire face a lot of backlash. And yet they persevere, because they understand fully what the English author George Orwell once wrote:

“Nothing is your own except the few cubic centimetres inside your skull.”

Freedom of speech. The literal meaning of the two main words in this statement are so liberating in themselves that people often forget that when negating the statement. In most countries in the world, freedom of speech is one basic human right but the consensus that it should be exercised varies from people to people. What is this right to begin with? It basically is having to be able to speak their mind and heart without anyone being able to question them. Now the thought might arise in someones mind that why would someone not like having the will to be free, to have sovereignty within yourself. In my opinion, it is because humans are so helpless by their very nature that they feel so empowered by their liberty and often tend to forget the feelings of their fellow beings. They forget that their words tend to have such a lasting impact on the life, the mind, the actions of another person.

In a country like Pakistan where there are divided sentiments about the freedom of speech and ratio between the liberal and conservative community has never been balanced or certain, this right is both a blessing and curse. It would be a tough row to hoe out if a correlation is drawn with events occurring in my country in order to the back the former statement so i would just state a recent event which occurred in Mardan University where a young student was recently killed due to exercising his basic human right.

Many have been interested about the idea of the right to speak freely. Essentially, this is a term that includes laws and directions on what people can state or can’t. As it were, it has the impact to control individuals’ dialect and thought. The United States among different nations have valued Freedom of Speech as they have considered it to be an essential right being shared by natives. Indeed, it has remained a colossal piece of the American culture. Be that as it may, there are steady annulments being postured against this idea. Maybe a couple of advantages and disadvantages of the right to speak freely can make it less demanding to settle on regardless of whether it ought to remain a noteworthy piece of the individuals.

This idea permits a man to have the ensured right of telling others about your considerations. In like manner, this will in any case let you say what you have to without the danger of fines or prison time regardless of the possibility that individuals don’t care for your thoughts. The idea of the right to speak freely has been viewed as a fundamental right by numerous in which they think of it as a premise in the continuation of well-being and prosperity of freedom. However, there are a few points that come mind with regards to the right to speak freely which can be hurtful and harmful to others.

As per article,freedom of speech also does not allow slander, libel, sedition, copyright infringement and revelation of classified knowledge. Viewed against these restrictions on US society, the constitution of Pakistan, under Article 19, explicitly lays down: “Every citizen shall have the right to freedom of speech and freedom of press, subject to any reasonable restrictions imposed by law in the interest of the glory of Islam, or the integrity, security and defence of Pakistan or any part thereof, friendly relations with foreign states, public order, decency or morality, or in relation to contempt of court, commission or incitement to an offence.”

To my fellow readers, social media users and most importantly my KEYBOARD WARRIORS I am here to talk about some things that you should keep in mind, (being a responsible young individual in this growing society) before you update that Facebook Status, Tweet your thoughts or even, let’s say, move a finger on social media.

Speak the truth and only the truth and nothing BUT the truth!

Freedom of speech comes parallel with your morals. Only speak the truth and avoid all kinds of false alarms and allegations. Your words can spread like wild fire on the media and you don’t want yourself or anyone else getting into trouble now do you?

Avoid all Biases

Its human nature to be leaning towards one side of a situation due to personal reasons, but as a responsible blogger you must know of that thin line between supporting your cause and justifying it even when it’s wrong. Your point Is not to prove the world you’re right, it should be towards the betterment.

You’re entitled to your own opinion, as are others!

Don’t forget that you will be met by differing opinions on such a vast forum. Sensitive topics like religion, politics and ideologies change from person to person, so do not at any point think that you are right while the others are wrong. Just as you have your reasons to support your cause, so do others.

DON’T pick up controversial topics for the sake of getting likes.

It’s become a trend. You see a blog, you read a blog, and you comment under it just for the sake of picking up a debate. Healthy debate is good, but a useless argument just to prove you can be a good speaker really disses the idea of freedom of speech on social Media.

Don’t target others just to hurt them.

A recent trend that started on Facebook (Don’t be a media bully) which I came across and felt the need to voice was how people started sharing pictures of some people and making memes out of them as a humiliation to the person in the picture. Don’t do that, free speech does not mean you are entitled to say anything and everything.

Often time’s people question what is ethical or not. What is ethical to one person might be unethical to another, and vise versa. This same belief goes with speech and the way we communicate. There are many words and slang’s that have a different meaning according to the person. With that said, someone should not be punished for a hate crime simply because we all analyze and portray speech differently. After reading both articles, my opinion did not change on the subject. If anything it just expanded into a more bias one.

No matter what your background is or who you are, you have sometime in your life had to deal with some kind of hatred speech. The difference is that some people have had to deal with it on a usual basis. If the government were to start punishing hate speech, then everyone would be a victim. People would start pressing charges on anyone who verbally abused them.

Nowadays, people are suing others for pretty much anything, and charging people with hate crimes would have the same effect. Jonathan Rauch from Harper’s Magazine states, “Eventually, any criticism of any group will be ‘prejudice.’” This statement sums up the fact that words mean many things and basically anything you say can be offensive to anyone. For instance, if I were to go up to a stranger and say what’s up dog, how are you, then different views could be portrayed? One view, the view that I intended would be calling him/her the slang word “dog” which really means bro or buddy. But others might view the slang word as being insultive or abusive to whom they are. The slang word “dog” is just one example of how words are used and portrayed differently by people. Another reason that punishing hate speech is insufficient is that people might think someone is talking bad about them, but in all actuality, no one is. Jonathan Rauch gives a great example of this when he explains his story about being on the bus. I’m sure you’ve read it, so I’m not going to explain it, but what I am going to say is that this happens everyday. Even if you see someone laughing at something, you think to yourself, “huh, are they laughing at me, do I have something in my nose?” We think like that, even though the other person is not directing his attention to you.

Speech is something that is vital for communication. It is something that we all can understand but is something that we view differently. We all have the freedom of speech and opinion, which partially makes us who we are. By taking away this freedom and punishing it, people would not be the same. So this is never ending debate.

A prison, they say, is supposedly among the safest places to be in. Not only is it secure, but at the same time it has a constant supply of food, clothing and medical care. Yet, the purpose of creating them is to punish people for their wrongdoings. The idea is that what a person values the most is his freedom, constraining which will lead to behavioral change.

In the contemporary era, where the world has suddenly gone digital; the social dynamics have also evolved drastically. Speeches, debates, orations and representation of opinions are now reflected through the internet. As social media has taken the world by storm, its repercussions are evident. Today, information of all types is easily accessible through the web. From abusing Hitler to debating over Marx, from ridiculing the policies of Donald Trump to citing the Panama Leaks; social media has given liberty of a new origin to the masses. This freedom has enabled the growth of nations, as they are given room to think on their own. The sheer amount of information and analytical insight available is enough to expose the truth in its entirety. In addition, the mere ability to voice their opinions and to have an actual say in matters is a huge confidence booster for the users.

Like all good things, there are a few strings that come attached with such amounts of freedom. With no supervision or accountability, it has proved to have disastrous effects. Such is the human nature, that there is always a degree of inclination that moves them towards negativity. There is a thin line that marks the difference between freedom and crimes of hate speech, bullying and defamation among other things. On numerous occasions, the world has witnessed these lines being crossed, resulting in total chaos. Take the UK riots of 2011 for example, or the murder of Mashal Khan in 2017; where humans turned organized and turned into barbarians through some viral messages. To understand this example in depth you can learn about the murder of Mashal Khan by reading about it in this link:

Humans are a mysterious race, and our times are even more so. There is no concept of a world without freedom, but unsupervised version of it is just as bad as its in-existence. In order to benefit from it without creating havoc, accountability is all we need.